MizB VIEWS FROM THE TOWER

JEANNE BROWNE is MizB, a Manhattan writer/citizen journalist offering posts from her skyscraper perch about contemporary culture, politics and major issues, language, and spirituality that transcends religion.

Thursday, February 26, 2015

I’ve always liked Shirley
MacLaine. I like her as an actress; as a woman who gained the respect to be
treated like one of the boys instead of a bimbo in Frank Sinatra’s Rat Pack;
and I like her interest in other cultures, distant lands, and
spiritual/philosophical ideas that make a lot of people think she’s wacky. She doesn’t
care if people think she’s a New Age nutjob and I like that, too.

But Shirley crossed a line when (as reported this week) in her new memoir, What If... (she’s written enough autobiographies for
several lifetimes), she wrote: “What if most Holocaust victims were balancing
their karma from ages before…The energy of killing is endless and will be
experienced by the killer and the killee.” Shirley isn't the first person to
suggest this connection. She’s just the first one to do so whom I like.

And not for nothing, but: killee? This is not a word. The word is victim. Not used in a sentence, one
might say: “The Nazis killed more than 12 million people, half of them Jews,
the rest: homosexuals, the aged, anti-Nazi political activists, the mentally
ill and retarded, the physically disabled, and everybody they caught trying to
help such people.”

The notion of karma –
which is the Sanskrit word for action,
human behavior – has been a core religious and philosophical concept since the
days of ancient India and remains so today in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism,
Sikhism and Taoism.

Unfortunately, in the
sense that Shirley means karma, it's bad karma and punishment in
this life for crimes, sins and other really bad stuff one did in this or a past
life. But the repercussions of bad karma are a small part of the
larger wisdom of karma. In all the traditional schools of thought and faith
there are The
12 Laws of Karma, and they are focused on how one should behave in this
life in order to learn, grow and make the world a better place. (Give it a
click, it’s a good read.)

Nowhere in karmic creed
does it say it’s permissible for someone to deliberately harm or kill another
as punishment for that person’s“bad
Karma.” But, not surprisingly, western New Agers have grabbed on to a piece of
a concept that appeals to them, in this case the idea that “you’ll get yours,” even
if it distorts the context of the larger laws of karma. Think of it as The Cliff Notes of Enlightenment On My Own Terms.

Which is why I have never
liked the concept of what-goes-around-comes-around bad karma. And I think it’s no accident that this aspect of
karma was so fervently embraced in Asia, which for many centuries has contained
styles and levels of poverty, starvation, cruelty, official punishment, criminal
violence and abject suffering that are particularly (if not uniquely) horrendous,
overwhelming, and seemingly beyond defeat. It’s much easier to watch a
paraplegic six year old drinking out of a mud hole, or listen to the screams of
a 12 year old being gang raped when you believe it’s their bad karma come home
to roost.

The idea of retribution
for bad karma is very dangerous right now. It places a tidy, comforting,
blanket of righteous cosmic justice on the unspeakable as we move further into
an era defined by terrorism, war, human trafficking, a desperate lack of the
basics of survival (food, water, shelter, the usual) in many places, a
lessening of human rights and an increase in oppression – especially of women
and girls – along with extraordinary poverty, the ravages of climate change,
and the dark side of new technology (signs of which are already apparent to
some, but not to most).

I haven’t read What If..., which includes many
other questions. So, to give Shirley the benefit of the
doubt, what if she was just posing a spiritual question about the
victims of the Holocaust? The problem with that question is the inherent
answer – which many people find insensitive and insulting – is
that the victims’ bad karma would make the Holocaust comprehensible and okay. It is neither. And to possibly suggest so
is a form of Holocaust Denial: yes, the Holocaust happened, but it was for a
sound spiritual reason.

Nein, Shirley. Such a conclusion would be
dishonest, dishonorable and disgusting. I don’t know if you’re wacky, but you
need to realign your chakras or dye your aura or change your mantra or something,
because you’ve got it all twisted. You’re 80 years old. Where’s your common
sense, personal growth and sound wisdom? Just asking a question.

Monday, January 19, 2015

For nearly two weeks –
which in today’s 24-hour-news-cycle essentially makes the horrific events in
Paris old news – I’ve been trying to write my
“Je Suis Charlie” post, but it just wasn’t coming out right. I knew Je Suis
Not Charlie, but I couldn’t properly
explain why.

Of course I’m an ardent supporter of free speech even (sometimes
especially) when it offends some people, and, I’m as sickened as anyone else by
violent, self-righteous, self-serving Islamist Extremist terrorism. I also completely
understand why millions of people in France and millions around the world
wanted to express their outrage with a spirit of “Je Suis Charlie” support.

Still, however symbolic rather
than sincerely specific that battle cry may be, I just couldn’t and still can’t
get with it. But when I awoke today, Martin Luther King Jr. Day (for some a Day
of Service, for others a Day of Shopping; yes, there are now King Day sales), I
knew I had the right words within me.

I am infuriated that The
Whackjob Brothers believed they had the right to murder the staff (and others)
of a satirical newspaper for the “crime” of disrespecting the Prophet Mohammed
and equally infuriated that their brother-in-arms felt entitled to invade a
kosher supermarket and kill people for the “crime” of being Jewish. I’m glad
they themselves were killed by police and I hope when they reach whatever afterlife they
were so looking forward to that the Prophet Mohammed screams “Not In My Name!”
and banishes them somewhere for eternity before they get to defile their quota of 72
virgins.

What Je Suis is opposed to hateful, violent intolerance. Je Suis also against
religious and atheistic orthodoxy, and not knowing the difference between
sophomoric, vulgar insult and sophisticated religious/political satire.
Have you seen any quantity of the cartoons published by Charlie Hebdo? Take
a look. For the most part, they’re disgusting and say nothing. The French
have long been regarded as the global arbiters of style but nobody’s perfect.
Let’s not forget that several generations of them adored Jerry Lewis and we
have them to thank for the endurance of post-WWI mime.

People have the right to
be disgusting and say nothing, and nobody has the right to kill them for it. Still,
it’s worth noting that before the terrorist attack, Charlie Hebdo (which has been disgusting and saying nothing about
all religions and politics since the 1970s) had a niche readership for its
weekly print run of 60,000 copies. The issue published after the attack sold
six million, obviously out of free speech solidarity. You gotta love the irony
of that.

Quotations by smart people
are one of my favorite things. Two at the top of my list are: “Who would you be
and how would you behave if there were no praise and no blame?” (Quentin Crisp,
about how he shaped his identity), and, “You can’t fight fire with fire, you have to fight
fire with water,” (Martin Luther King Jr., on why he believed non-violence
could triumph over violence).

Terrorism
shows us the darkest side of who people are willing to be and behave if they don’t
give a damn about what anyone thinks of them (especially when they're certain they're right). Terrorism also makes us wonder if
the calming water of non-violence really has the power to defeat the scourge of
terrorism. I think it may if an
assortment of non-violent actions are employed.

For starters, the U.S.
should get out and stay out of Muslim countries and let the chips fall where
they may; our military presence helps nothing. Second, France and other
countries with marginalized Muslim communities must bring them into the
national fold through vastly improved education, economic opportunities, and
the removal of discriminatory laws. If Muslim women want to wear
their headscarves, let them. That's hardly the same thing as trying to impose Sharia law.

Most important, the vast
majority of moderate Muslims who are also the vast majority of Jihadist victims
must find the courage to stand up and
speak out and, as they did in Paris, tell their crazies “Not In My Name!” until
it finally sinks in. The world community must identify and remove Extremist sources
of funds, weapons and day-to-day survival. Public relations (propaganda) on a
massive, cooperative scale must counter recruiting and radicalizing efforts. Last but not
least, the world community must use its best information technology to cut
off the information technology of terrorists. And when/where necessary, spies
and intelligence services everywhere should covertly
kill terrorists. A little violence will, unfortunately, be necessary. It's like with Nazis. The water of non-violence will get you just so far.

Before ignorance, hatred, fear and violence took
Martin Luther King Jr. from us all, he was beginning to talk about the
undeniably connected dots of racial oppression, exclusion, poverty, ignorance,
addiction, nutrition, anger, despair, injustice, and
a huge rift in communication between disparate communities. On this day of
celebrating his work, hope, dreams, and faith, it would be very helpful if we
could enlarge our own capacities for those same strengths. That is what might ultimately defeat American racism. And
maybe it can play a major role in defeating international Islamic terrorism, too.

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

As someone who strongly
believes in the importance of free speech and uncensored creative expression, I
have of course been extremely interested in and concerned about the “SONY
Situation.” This is extremely important because it’s about a whole lot more
than a controversial movie. It is a seminal 21st Century dilemma: the
first major confluence of new technology, violent and cyber terrorism, the traditional
American definition of Democracy, culture clash, Capitalism, electronic news
media, and human behavior in the still-developing “new normal.” This is a big subject
but I’ll tackle what I can in this post.

I started writing this
post at least a week ago, and there have been new developments in the past
couple of days. So to summarize the incident that provoked an international
mess: SONY, a giant American entertainment company, was grievously cyber attacked
by North Korean extremists (and possibly the NK government itself) because it
produced a satirical comedy film about the assassination of the real-life,
sitting, North Korean president, Kim Jong-un. The news media ill-advisedly but
not surprisingly focused on the celebrity gossip revealed by the hack-attack
instead of the depth and implications of the attack itself.

Then, SONY and America were
threatened with 9/11-scale attacks against movie theaters if the film was
released. All of the country’s theater chains united in their refusal to show the
film; Sony announced it would not release the film (like they had a choice,
once the theaters decided not to show it); and much of the film industry and
some politicians, including President Obama, criticized SONY for giving in to
threats, because nobody can tell us what kind of movies we can and cannot make,
and, America shouldn’t surrender its core freedoms out of fear.

The irony is we already have surrendered some of our core
freedoms out of fear. America was rattled to its previously complacent bones by
the 9/11 attacks, though we were determined not to let it show. President John
Wayne Bush stood on the World Trade Center rubble and literally told the terrorists to “bring it on,” to prove that our
national balls, pride, and courage were undefeatably enormous.

But a few weeks
later, Congress and the Senate passed the Patriot Act with whiplash speed. It
is still in place, giving the government’s numerous intelligence and
security agencies unprecedented permission to spy, bug, physically gather, and
in other ways obtain private information about individuals, to basically do
whatever they deem necessary to whomever they regard as suspicious in the name of national security.

Some Americans and some
organizations objected. In the minority quarters that value privacy and civil
rights for individuals, Ben Franklin’s sage quotation: They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety was dusted off and given new exposure.
But it didn’t change anything because it turns out that most Americans are willing to exchange “essential
liberty” (privacy, free speech, creative expression, etc.) for whatever sense
of safety they can secure.

In the last few days, the
country and the companies (SONY and the theaters) seem to have decided to
macho-man-up again. President Obama asked China to do what they can to keep North
Korea in check. It was suggested that North Korea be added to our official
“watch” list of nations/organizations most likely to attempt a terrorist
attack, though at this moment I don’t know if that’s been done. Some theaters
decided to change their corporate minds about showing the film, and SONY, it
appears, has changed its mind about releasing it, even if it will be a more
limited release than originally planned. For a Christmas Day debut. Merry Christmas.

Now we come to our
national love affair with technology – which is really just our most recent infatuation
with a big, shiny, major new toy, a love that knows no bounds and sees no downside
until the initial glow wears off, and that process can take quite a while. We embraced
the Information Age with the same passion we lavished on the Industrial
Revolution.

I’m not saying America or
the world would all be better off living like the Amish. I’m just pointing out
that we have a history of plunging into the seductive technically new in the
present, without regard for its impact on what we value from the past, or
anticipating the potential disadvantages of the presently new in the future.
This is especially concerning now as we further explore artificial intelligence
and robotics in a spirit of childlike wonder.

Through technology, what
used to be a great big world has, from the 19th Century on, become a
much smaller one. Throw differing religions, cultures, economics and politics
into the mix and it becomes quite a muddle. Add poor education, increased poverty,
huge gaps in human rights and civil rights, terrorism, war and other forms of armed
conflict, environmental change, and population growth, and you have the complex
quagmire we call Now.

So, in regard to the “Sony
Situation,” I believe that our 18th Century ideas of what Freedom
and Democracy allow for were and are rightly challenged, not just by outside anger and danger, but also by a certain measure of contemporary
common sense as well. In every discussion of free speech, it is pointed out
that while people should have an unfettered right to express their ideas and
opinions, they don’t have the right to be irresponsible – such as shouting
Fire! Fire! in a crowded movie theater when there is no fire.

I am of the opinion that
in this day and age, producing a
major motion picture about the assassination of any named, real-life, sitting president of any country – even a bizarre
little despot like Kim Jong-un – is the creative equivalent of Fire! Fire!,
especially when you consider that totalitarian dictators and the populations
they rule have no working concept of humor, let alone satire. And just because
one has the right and freedom to do something doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to
do it.

What would the American
response be if a foreign country – say France, England or Australia, all of
which have thriving film industries, unlike our chief national enemies – made a
satirical comedy about the assassination of the named, specific, actual Barack
Obama? The President himself, who has a great sense of humor and understands
the concept of satire, would probably just roll with the punches as he has with
everything that’s been thrown at him.
But I doubt Mrs. Obama would appreciate it, nor would the Democratic Party, nor
would many Americans who support, even love, the President. We wouldn’t be
hearing about free speech and creative freedom in that scenario.

The “SONY Situation” puts the
company, the film industry, and the government in the satirically comic
position of having to defend a film that shouldn’t have been made in the first
place, in the name of free speech, creative freedom, and not allowing other
countries to push us around. Why? In no small part because of Capitalism.
America’s leading export is entertainment: film, television, music, video games
and increasingly stand-up comedy. And for many years now, Hollywood product in
all categories has been built on a foundation of graphic violence, drugs and
sex.

So when our government
tells us that terrorists hate us for our freedom, that is only part of the
truth. They also hate us for the nature and content of our popular culture, our
military intervention in their countries, and our constant efforts at regime
change (what we like to call nation building). We are determined to spread
Democracy and Capitalism, two different things that many Americans think are
the same.

I know there are critical
human rights issues at stake, but it’s not a simple matter to resolve and we
tend to make our efforts to fix and change things in a manner that other
countries find decidedly objectionable. They think we’re crazy, just as we
think they’re crazy. I do think they’re much crazier than we are. However, we
have little with which to defend ourselves. Because our other top export is
Consumerism – in concept and action. Ours is a youth-&-beauty-obsessed,
celebrity-worshiping, materialistic culture. We value money, power, prestige and
things more than people. We are the
least developed nation among all developed nations when it comes to economic
equality, education, health care, and our regard for the poor and elderly.

I think the current
defense of The Interview, filled with
Constitutional dismay about SONY’s initial response, is misplaced: the right
defense for the wrong thing. Where was a similar torrent of outrage when NewSouth
Books put a fig leaf on Huckleberry Finn
by changing the use of “nigger” to “slave,” even though this is a classic work
of fiction that reflects the accurate, actual use of language in its historical
place in time?

Hasn’t the rigidity of political correctness also
mindlessly and uncreatively undermined free speech and creative expression? Comedian Lenny Bruce, poet Allen Ginsberg, and photographer Robert
Mapplethorpe were never given the succor of the First Amendment in their time,
even though they richly deserved it. The "SONY Situation" requires a lot of
thought and deserves much intelligent discussion – but The Interview is a regrettable launch pad for it.

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Don Henley’s “The End of the Innocence”
is playing as I write this because for the last few weeks (and more) that’s
what’s happened for a lot us – those of us paying attention, those of us who don’t
have the money or the heart to get lost in the Christmas hustle that feels so unimportant
and unreal this year. We as a nation have been awash in waves of shame and
pride: our own, each others, those of leaders and idols and ordinary people
turned into symbols they never wanted to be.

Yesterday’s CIA “Torture
Report” was so revolting it actually inspired bipartisan anger and shame in the
Senate. We already knew “intensified interrogation techniques” (G-d save us
from the danger of euphemisms) had been used after the 9/11 terrorist attacks
in the governmental zeal to preempt further assaults. But we didn’t how deeply,
cruelly “intensified” they were, or for how long they went on, against so many
people, and how ineptly and chaotically the process was handled. “This isn’t
who we are,” said an aggrieved President Obama about the program approved by
his predecessor. But it is. It’s a big part of who we are and have always been,
in spirit, from the genocide of the Indians through Slavery, Jim Crow, Vietnam,
and the deeply divided country we’ve become.

And from Ferguson to
Staten Island to Cleveland (among others), the recent racial conflicts between
police and young Black men (and a child) have made it plain that largely White
law enforcement still doesn’t know how to cope with Black communities; that the
Judicial System is equally broken and ignorant; and that Americans of all ages
and colors are still capable of uniting in peaceful, nonviolent protest against
the cancer of racism. Dirty waves of shame, cleansing waves of pride.

A lot of people – mostly White – thought the election of President Obama showed that racism was over in
America, an idea that would be hilarious if it weren’t so treacherously untrue.
I recall the young, rousing, Barack Obama speaking at the 2004 Democratic
Convention saying there was no Black America or White America, just One America.
I understood how much he wanted that to be so. I too am biracial and when I was
still quite young, I believed it was my destiny, my responsibility, to be a
communicator and a racial unifier, because I had a foot in both worlds. I never
did figure out how to do that and, it turns out, neither has Barack Obama, even
though he’s a whole lot smarter than I am and worked a million times harder.

The unfortunate, revealing,
truth is Obama’s election fueled a resurgence of rampant, outspoken,
unapologetic racism. I’m sure he expected some push-back, but I think even he
was taken off-guard by how forceful it’s been. I don’t think he expected it
would grind Congress to a halt, or lead a right-slanted Supreme Court to eviscerate
the Voting Rights Act in the midst of a nationwide Voter Suppression Movement,
or that he would be called an illegitimate president who is behaving like a
king because he’s done the same kinds of things the White presidents did –
mainly, behaving like The President.

As we enter a two-year
campaign for the 2016 presidential election (please, shoot me now), the pundits are discussing the Obama Legacy, as if it can be assessed just like any
other presidency. His legacy, for the record, is that he kept us out of another
Great Depression, re-grew the economy quite impressively with no help from
either house of Congress, achieved a first attempt at something resembling
national health care insurance even though it’s woefully sloppy and
over-detailed, accomplished a bushel of things few people either know about or
remember (take a look at the White House website), appointed two progressive
women to the Supreme Court, conducted himself with presidential dignity in the
face of consistent disrespect, managed to get re-elected and be a two-term
president, and to date has avoided assassination, even though, it would appear,
the Secret Service doesn’t entirely have his back.

Now the media are
asking what he’s going to do about racism in America – especially since
he’s worked so hard to be The President, not The Black President, and hasn’t
wanted to make White people feel…excluded? ignored? uncared for? The irony here
(one of several) is that even though White people hold all the cards, a lot of
them always feel short-changed because they think poor people and minorities
get all the breaks and benefits. They really believe that! The same way rich
people (who, except for a handful of entertainers and athletes, are pretty much
exclusively White) think they’re taken advantage of because they’re rich. The
mind reels.

I guess we’ll have to [hope and] wait for
Hillary Clinton. Maybe she can do something about “race
relations,” since paying any
attention to women’s issues would clearly be favoritism. Shame and pride, pride
and shame, and the increased loss of personal and national innocence as the eternal foibles of reality bubble up. And I don’t even have room left to
talk about Bill Cosby.

Sunday, November 09, 2014

It’s a cool, dry, late
Sunday morning here in New York City and if I had the emotional strength, I
could be watching the major, weekly political talk shows (Meet the Press and such) that are no doubt now taking the “long
view” perspective on Tuesday’s election (in 21st century time,
that’s five days later instead of five minutes later). But I have my own long
view perspective, and, I’ve received several emails over the past few days
offering very specific approaches to what ails us as a nation, the contents of
which I want to share with you. They show that there is hope, there are things
everyone can do.

My own perspective is that
what will happen legislatively over the next two years is anybody’s guess,
because the Republicans are not going to stop being who they are – although it appears that the less wildly crazy wing
of the party seems to now be in charge. But their core allegiance to the rich
and corporate, and their inbred lack of understanding and concern for everyone
and everything else, remains intact.

The President, while being
genuinely willing to negotiate and compromise – which he has been willing to do
since Day One, while the Republicans have been busy hating him and obstructing
everything he’s tried to do – is, I believe, also more intent on pushing
forward with the things he actually believes in, the things he hasn’t
heretofore been very aggressive about, to the consternation of his Progressive
base. So what will actually happen is a crap shoot and will no doubt be
interesting and aggravating to watch.

Fortunately, there are
people out there, people with actual political power, who see some
opportunities for Democrats (legislators and ordinary citizens alike) to get
their act together and begin to articulate a cohesive message as they move through the molasses-paced 2016
campaign that has already begun, with a simple and sensible agenda.

My first email came from
the Progressive
Change Campaign Committee, which published an op-ed on the political
website, The
Hill, entitled “Route to Power for Democrats: Big Ideas,” which espouses
the reasonable, progressive, Sen.
Elizabeth Warren agenda of “taking on Wall Street, reducing student debt,
and expanding Social Security benefits,” as a primary message that all practical
working people can get behind.

The second message came from
Sen. Bernie Sanders, whose primary
message is that the influence of Big Money in politics (a privilege for the
rich so smoothly sanctioned by the Supreme Court’s legitimization of the democracy-busting
Citizen’s
United fundraising operation) must be eradicated. He also stresses that the
enormity of Income Inequality, which pits the tiny but extraordinarily wealthy
Billionaire Class (several hundred families holding 95% of the nation’s wealth)
against the rest of us (that famous, or infamous, 1% vs. 99% equation) must be
balanced with significant tax reform, a stronger labor movement, and a
federally-increased minimum wage.

To increase public involvement in and support
for this agenda, one of the many things Sen. Sanders is doing is proposing that
Election Day be made a Federal Holiday called Democracy Day to promote the
meaning and importance of democracy and the vital role that ordinary folks play
in it by voting (and making it easier to vote because as a federal holiday,
people will get a paid day off from work). He has proposed a bill and created a
petition that you can sign.

Last but not least came a
wonderful article by one Mark Morford published in San Francisco’s SFGate
entitled “The
Best Worst President Ever,” which strives to explain why much of the middle
and upper classes have come to embrace the Republican Big Lie that Barack Obama
is the “worst President ever.” No one can deny that the President has made
mistakes and is not a perfect person or a perfect President (no human is
perfect!). But many people are willing to entirely dismiss his considerable
accomplishments for both political – and racist – reasons. This is a good and
important read.

Indeed, if you click on all the links in this
blog post you will learn a lot more about how progressive Democrats and
Independents (and maybe even secretly-rational Republicans) can work from this
important point forward to avoid the United States of America turning into a
full-scale oligarchy disaster.

About MizB (personally)

Jeanne Browne (aka MizB) is a single, 62-year-old, born-and-bred New Yorker, raised in the Bronx and (primarily) Brooklyn by her White/Jewish mother and Black (West Indian)/ Episcopalian father; she steadfastly considers herself biracial. She is an Old School Liberal who participated in the major human rights movements of her time: Civil Rights, Women’s Rights, anti-Vietnam War, and Gay Rights. She is greatly distressed by the stupidity, rigidity and meanness of contemporary politics. She is a secular Jew and a spiritual appreciator of the life and cosmic mysteries for which we have no answers. She is an ordained Interfaith Minister of Spiritual Counseling as well as a certified Professional Tarot Reader. She has almost no sense of connection to animals, nature, or children. She basically hates most of the new information technology that has taken over the world's hearts and capacity to think and communicate. She is an unrepentant cigarette smoker (makes her own) and is not ashamed of being FAT! She loves books & libraries, 60s folk music, rock'n'roll, and folk/rock, good literature, detective fiction, old movies, public television, smart stand-up comedy, and great food of all kinds. She is passionate about language and hates the way it is being increasingly degraded and devalued. MizB is a nice woman with a wonderful sense of humor, but an admitted curmudgeon.